Fashion Week and Fur Protests

PETA has become renowned for their anti-fur protests at fashion weeks over the last couple of decades, from the disruption of Oscar de la Renta's fur show in 1991 to meetings with Calvin Klein in 1994, right up to this year's protests in London. For me at least there is no doubt about the effectiveness of PETA's fur protests, more and more designers are rejecting fur and other materials sourced from animals in favour of more ethical options, but there can be no doubt that these protest will continue until the abuse of animals to create clothing has stopped.

There definitely is a slower move to more ethical and environmentally friendly options by luxury brands because by nature they are slower to enact change due to long production times and small client bases. As well as this their products are generally not to be thrown away and are made to last. This definitely a case of waiting for designer brands to move towards a blending of ethics and environmentally conscious choices while maintaining the aesthetic that the brand represents.I think this slow change is the reason that the PETA protests have become so prolific in recent years during fashion month (made up of fashion weeks in New York, London, Milan and Paris). It is during fashion month that these designers take the world stage and set the trends for the upcoming year, not only this but there is an incredible amount of press coverage and social media discussion about the events. Thus making the protest reach as many people as possible, and therefore more effective at creating change within the industry. These protests are not the only thing demanding change, even surveys conducted by the RSPCA in 2011 found that 95% of Brits wouldn't wear real fur, which begs the question why are fur and other animal materials still produced so openly?Now personally I was never always against fur and other animal-based materials, I still own leather shoes from before I went vegan, I used to have a goose down duvet for most of my life. Fundamentally the reason I was never against all of these things was because I never questioned the way they were produced I allowed them to be disconnected from the violence and abuse that is required to create them. But the protests this year at London fashion week opened my eyes to something new, the detrimental environmental and heath effects of the production of real fur and leather etc. Please don't wear real fur or leather or any other material from an animal! Because if for no other reason no one wants to be like Cruella de Vil XO, Miriam P.S. Here are some resources that I used to inform this post and that have more info on other protests both physical and online: